Discrepancy between parental reports of infants' receptive vocabulary and infants' behaviour in a preferential looking task

Houston-Price, Carmel; Mather, Emily; Sakkalou, Elena

Abstract

Two experiments are described which explore the relationship between parental reports of infants' receptive vocabularies at 1;6 (Experiment 1a) or 1;3, 1;6 and 1;9. (Experiment 1b) and the comprehension infants demonstrated in a preferential looking task. The instrument used was the Oxford CDI, a British English adaptation of the MacArthur-Bates CDI (Words Ss Gestures). Infants were shown pairs of images of familiar objects, either both name-known or both name-unknown according to their parent's responses on the CDI. At all ages, and on both name-known and name-unknown trials, preference for the target image increased significantly from baseline when infants heard the target's label. This discrepancy suggests that parental report underestimates infants' word knowledge. © 2007 Cambridge University Press.

Citation

Houston-Price, C., Mather, E., & Sakkalou, E. (2007). Discrepancy between parental reports of infants' receptive vocabulary and infants' behaviour in a preferential looking task. Journal of child language, 34(4), 701-724. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305000907008124

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Online Publication Date: Oct 24, 2007
• Publication Date: 2007-11
• Deposit Date: May 31, 2019
• Journal: Journal of Child Language
• Print ISSN: 0305-0009
• Electronic ISSN: 1469-7602
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 34
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 701-724
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0305000907008124
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/724011